Abstract

A discussion of a pamphlet, 'A True Account of the Proceedings at Perth' (1716), which had been attributed to Daniel Defoe in the nineteenth century by James Crossley. Although clearly a work of fiction, and designed in part as propaganda in favour of the Septennial Act, the pamphlet has been drawn upon by historians as if it were a work of sober historical fact. Although it is not impossible that Defoe could have written it, there is remarkably little evidence that he did.